A sergeant from the Public Safety Department let them into the apartment. Because the city leased Roosevelt Island to the State of New York, the crime scene fell under its jurisdiction, and Heat was there as a guest. After she had badged and logged in, a Roosevelt Island Public Safety Department detective led her and Rook from the foyer to the living room, where they found Sampson Stallings hunched forward on the couch with his back to them. The room was a sunlit and airy showplace with a high vaulted ceiling and broad windows that looked onto a breathtaking panorama of the river and the Upper East Side to the west and the landmark Octagon to the north. Both views were lost on Lon King’s partner, whose head hung in grief.
Stallings rose to shake their hands and invited them to sit. Heat, who had her own connection to violent loss, expressed her condolences, which only caused his bloodshot eyes to glisten anew. He smiled bravely, but his lips, framed by the tight salt-and-pepper curls of his goatee, quivered, betraying the miserable imprint of heartbreak.
Rook stayed out of the conversation, letting Nikki lead Stallings to share reminiscences about his life partner of a decade. Business would come soon enough; she understood that every investigation had a heart, too. “Thank you for listening to me go on,” he said, plucking a tissue from the box on the coffee table, which caused Nikki to observe that Lon King had set up his living room a lot like his practice, right down to the Kleenex placement. “It feels better to talk.”
“A page out of the Lon King playbook.”
He gave her an appraisal. “You knew him?”
She smiled. “Probably more accurate to say he knew me. Dr. King didn’t give up a lot.”
“You should have tried living with him.” Stallings let out a laugh, then retreated from it as if in shame.
“So he never mentioned me?” When he shook his head no, she said, “What about other patients, clients…”
“No, as I mentioned to the detective yesterday…”
“Detective Aguinaldo?”
“Yes, nice woman. As I told her, Lonnie was very discreet. Oh, once in a while, he’d share a story—a doozer, he’d call them, usually funny—but never a name. It wouldn’t have meant anything to me, anyway.”
“He never mentioned them, even if they threatened him?”
“Lon kept it all locked down, you understand?” He made a tamping gesture with his slender artist’s hands.
Rook joined in with a question that seemed to Heat more than just something out of left field. “Sampson, did Lon ever mention someone offering him money to talk about his clients or cases?”
“Well, he had some serious debt issues, we know that. From his gambling. But he would never, never cross an ethical line and sell out his patients.”
“I believe that,” said Rook. “But my question is, did anyone ever try to induce him to?”
“Not that I know of.”
Rook nodded to Heat, signaling that was all he wanted to ask. His question gave her pause. Why the hell was he sniffing around a potential bribe? Was this related to some critical piece of information he was holding back on? Her anger started to rekindle, but she set it aside. Something to deal with later. Nikki brought the conversation back to her own agenda.” Do you mind going over what happened this morning again?” Stallings shook his head no and sipped some water from a CamelBak bottle. Heat gestured to the RIPSD man sitting on the bar-stool near the kitchen. “I know you already told the detective.”
“That’s fine, I understand.”
“The report I got was that you confronted an intruder here?”